I 


THE YEAR’S WORK 

-IN- 

Civil-Service Reform, 

AN ADDRESS DELIVERED 


AT THE ANNUAL MEETING OF 


The National Civil-Service Reform League 


HON. GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS 


NEW YORK: 

PUBLISHED FOR THE 

NATIONAL CIVIL-SERVICE REFORM LEAGUE, 
1884. 








Publications of the National League. 

SEPTEMBER, 1884. 

Proceedings at the Annual Meeting of the National Civil-Service 
Reform League, 1882 , with address by George William Curtis. 
.Per copy, 10 cts. Per 100,. $7 5 ® 

The same for 1883 . Per copy, 10 cts. Per 100, . . . $7 50 

The same for 1884 . Per copy, 10 cts. Per 100, . . $7 50 

The Year’s Work in Civil Service Reform. By George William 
Curtis. Per copy, 3 cts. Per 100, ... - $2 50 

Report on the Expediency of Asking Candidates for Public Office 
their Views on Civil-Service Reform. Per copy, 10 cts. 
Per 100, . . . . . . . $7 50 

Address to the Voters of the United States. By George William 
Curtis. Per copy, i ct. Per 100,.75 cts. 

The Four Years’ Term, or Rotation in Office. By Frederic W. 
Whitridge. Per copy, 3 cts. Per 100, . . . . $2 00 


PUBLICATIONS OF THE NEW YORK ASSOCIATION. 

I. Purposes of the Civil-Service Reform Association, including 
its constitution. Per copy, 5 cts. 

II. The Beginning of the Spoils System in the National Gov¬ 
ernment, 1829 - 30 . (Reprinted, by permission, from Parton’s 
“I.ife of Andrew Jackson.”) Per copy, 5 cts. Per 100, $3 00 

III. The Spoils System and Civil-Service Reform in the Custom- 

House and Post-Office at New York. By Dorman B. Eaton. 
136 pages, 8vo. Per copy, 25 cts. Per 100, . , $10 00 

IV. Civil-Service Reform in the New York Custom-House. By 

Willard Brown. Per copy, 5 cts. Per 100, . . . $3 00 

V. Term and Tenure of Office. By Dorman B. Eaton. Per copy, 25 cts. 
Second edition, abridged. Per copy, 15 cts. Per 100, . $10 00 

VII. The Danger of an Office-Holding Aristocracy. By E. L. 
Godkin. Per copy, 5 cts. Per 100, . . • $3 00 




THE YEAR’S WORK 


-IN- 

Civil-Service Reform, 

AN ADDRESS DELIVERED 


AT THE ANNUAL MEETING OF 


The National Civil-Service Reform Leagoe 


HON. GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS 


NEW YORK: 

PUBLISHED FOR THE 

NATIONAL CIVIL-SERVICE REFORM LEAGUE, 
1884. 





p 

f >ubl. 




PRESS OF 

WILLIAM S. GOTTSBERGER, 
11 Murray St., New York. 


The Year’s Work 

IN 

Civil-Service Reform. 


At the last annual meeting of the National civil-service re¬ 
form league, two resolutions were unanimously adopted which 
announced the special objects to be sought by the league and the 
friends of reform during the year now ended. One of the reso¬ 
lutions recommended to all the reform associations in the country 
to make strenuous and unceasing efforts to secure the repeal of 
the laws of the United States which fix the tenure of certain ad¬ 
ministrative offices at four years. The other resolution urged the 
associations to spare no efforts to procure the passage of laws ex¬ 
tending the principles of the reform bill to the civil service of the 
states and cities of the country. It is now my duty to report to 
you what progress has been made in accomplishing these results. 

The limitations imposed by the law of 1820 and by the sub¬ 
sequent acts upon the term of certain offices, was an abandonment 
of the practice that prevailed during the first 30 years of the 
government, and the change was introduced for the purpose of 
vacating the offices that they might be filled by the appointing 



4 


power. It was intended to facilitate the prostitution of the public 
service to personal and party ends, and the result has fully proved 
the sagacity of the political schemers who designed the law. Six 
years after the law was passed, a special committee of the Senate 
declared that it defeated its own professed object by turning out 
faithful officers instead of retaining them. That is to say, it de¬ 
feated its professed purpose by accomplishing its real purpose. It 
did not improve the public service of the country, but it greatly 
benefited the private service of the politicians who controlled the 
patronage. The law of 1820 and the subsequent acts vacate dur¬ 
ing every presidential term the offices upon which the vast multi¬ 
tude of minor places in the public service depend, and, as re-ap¬ 
pointment is not necessarily secured by official fidelity and effic¬ 
iency, but is determined by personal and political favor and intrigue, 
the public employe is naturally engaged in propitiating the influ¬ 
ence which can retain him in place. This is one of the most 
obvious ways in which the spoils system strikes at the self-respect 
of the public employe, and at the same time influences the zeal of 
the office-seeker to cultivate a still stronger influence to thrust the 
incumbent from his position. 

In accordance with the recommendation of the National 
league, the reasons of the proposed action were submitted to the 
country. When Congress met in December a bill repealing the 
acts in question was introduced in both houses, and petitions 
signed by eminent citizens were presented from various states ask¬ 
ing the passage of the bill. The appeal was prefced before the 
committee of the House with ample knowledge, eloquence, and 
ability by committees of the league and of local associations who 
went to Washington for the purpose, and the passage of the bill 


5 


repealing the four years’ tenure was unanimously recommended to 
the House by the committee on reform in the civil service. 

Meanwhile signs of some reaction of feeling upon the subject 
naturally appeared. At the opening of the session of Congress, 
both Houses in filling the minor positions in their service utterly 
disregarded the fundimental principle of the reform bill which they 
had passed a year before. This action was followed early in the 
session by two propositions introduced in the House of Repre¬ 
sentatives to repeal the law, and at the same time Mr. Pendleton, 
whose name is honorably associated with the reform bill, was de¬ 
feated in the Legislature of Ohio for reelection to the Senate of 
the United States. His advocacy of reform was one of the ob¬ 
jections which were warmly urged against him; and his successful 
competitor, in a public speech after his election, showed his utter 
want of sympathy with the reform spirit, as well as his total ignor¬ 
ance of the practical methods and scope of the reformed system. 
Such re-actionary tendencies, however, are not surprising, nor are 
they discouraging. There are always bats and owls overtaken by 
the rising sun, but, despite their blinking and hooting and flutter¬ 
ing, the sun “ goes marching on.” 

It was on the 21st of April that Mr. Mutchler of Pennsyl¬ 
vania moved in the House of Representatives to suspend the rules 
to take up the bill to repeal the four years’ law, which was unani¬ 
mously recommended by the committee on reform in the civil 
service. Mr. McMillin of Tennessee opposed the repeal on the 
ground that the tenure of office act requiring the consent of the 
Senate for the removal of an officer would create a life tenure, and 
Mr. McMillin deprecated a life tenure as intolerable, arguing that 
if an officer be faithful it is but little trouble to reappoint him, but 


6 


if he is not faithful, he thought that his term of service should be 
allowed to expire, and that then without any executive act he 
should be dropped from the service. It seemed not to have 
occurred to Mr. McMillin that, if it be little trouble to reappoint 
such an officer, it is still less trouble to leave him undisturbed 
until there is some proper reason for disturbing him. Nor did Mr. 
McMillin appear to see clearly that the executive oath honestly 
to enforce the laws requires not that an unfaithful officer should be 
allowed to serve out his term, but that he should be peremptorily 
dismissed as soon as his unfaithfulness is known. The abuse of 
the four years’ law is not that inefficient officers are suffered to 
drop from the service at the end of their terms, but that efficient 
officers are dropped when their terms end, and, although it is but 
little trouble to renominate them, they are not renominated, be¬ 
cause their places are wanted not for the public advantage but for 
party or personal profit. And it is for the very reason that this 
wrong is effected without any executive act of removal that the 
repeal of the law is sought, in order that the responsibility for the 
removal of faithful officers shall rest in the eyes of the country 
where it belongs, upon the appointing power. The present laws 
serve the purpose for which they were designed, namely, to place 
all the officers at the disposition of the president and to enable him 
for any political or personal purpose, noiselessly and without an 
order of removal, to dismiss any officer, however faithful, capable,, 
and experienced he may be. There is no more ingenious device 
than the four-years’ law for promoting, as Mr. Jefferson said, in¬ 
trigue and corruption, and the constant and demoralizing greed of 
place. Having earnestly protested against the repeal and warned 
the House against a life tenure, Mr. McMillen concluded by de- 


7 


daring that nobody was more anxious for a true civil-service reform 
than he. 

Mr. Willis of Kentucky, who introduced the bill and who has 
taken a conspicuous and effective part in reform legislation, replied 
forcibly to Mr. McMillen that the theory of a life tenure was 
wholly chimerical, and that, even were it not so, it was an objection 
inapplicable to places in the service which are not political. He 
showed that all the offices affected by the repeal are entirely non¬ 
political, and that nobody was able to say, and never had anybody 
been able to say, why honest, capable, and faithful public servants 
should be turned adrift at the end of four years. No reason, 
indeed, could be given except that, under the abuses of the spoils 
system, such ministerial places have been regarded not as public 
trusts but as bribes to secure partisan service. Mr. Willis stated 
the simple truth that the repeal does not reverse the settled policy 
of administration. On the contrary it removes flagrant abuses that 
have destroyed the original constitutional practice, and restores 
the policy of Washington and the founders of the government. 
Mr. Springer of Illinois opposed especially the provisions of the 
bills which authorized the judges of the supreme court in the terri¬ 
tories to hold during good behavior or until the territory shall be 
admitted as a state. Mr. Springer’s speech was evidently only a 
partisan appeal, and was of no weight whatever. Mr. Dibble of 
South Carolina argued that the patronage of the executive now 
placed in the hands of one man power too great for a republican 
form of government, but he opposed the repeal of the four-years’ 
term, although it necessarily increases the danger of that power 
by facilitating its abuse. He thought, however, that a term of 
seven years would promote genuine civil-service reform. But the 


8 


argument for a term of seven years, which is that it would tend to 
prevent mere political removals, is a stronger argument for the repeal 
of all fixed terms for merely ministerial places. Mr. Holman of 
Indiana saw no hope for reform in the civil service until the sala¬ 
ries of public officers are made to correspond to those which are 
paid in private employments. Mr. Holman’s chief argument, 
however, was that upon which the four-years’ bill was originally 
justified; namely, the desirability of the stated closing and public 
scrutiny of all public accounts, and the moral effect upon the 
officer of the knowledge that his reappointment and continuance 
in office will depend upon the proof of his perfect integrity and 
capability and promptness in the administration of his trust. Mr. 
Holman was apparently unaware that, six years after the passage 
of the law, the select committee of the Senate reported that the 
results which Mr. Holman described as those which the bill would 
secure were not secured, and that the expiration of the term had 
already come to be regarded as the creation of a vacancy to be 
filled by a new appointment. Nine years later, in 1835, 
Webster declared the evil results of the law to be much greater 
than any advantages which had been derived from it, and with 
Clay, Calhoun, Benton, Ewing, Southard, White, and other eminent 
leaders of both parties, he warmly advocated repeal. Mr. Holman 
also deprecated a life tenure, and was followed by Mr. Finalay of 
Maryland, who read an admirable letter from George S. Cole, 
secretary of the civil-service reform association of that State, and 
on behalf of the executive committee, urging the general argument 
in favor of reform. 

The debate was fitly closed by Theodore Lyman of Massa¬ 
chusetts, the first member of Congress ever elected upon the dis- 


9 


tinct issue of civil-service reform. In a brief speech he argued 
cogently that, having provided that merely ministerial places shall 
be filled by proved fitness, it was now necessary to make chief ap¬ 
pointing officers strictly responsible and accountable. This result 
is effected by giving them the power of removal and taking from 
them the temptation to abuse the power. But the four-years’ act 
interferes with this power, because under that act it is held, as Mr. 
McMillen argued, that a man shall be allowed to serve out his 
prescribed term unless his conduct is absolutely intolerable. The 
repeal would restore the practice of the early administrations, and, 
instead of establishing a life tenure, it would provide the utmost 
freedom of removal with the most rigid responsibility to the people 
for the exercise of the power. Mr. Herbert of Alabama asked 
whether the tenure of office act does not enable a hostile Senate 
practically to prohibit a president from removing officers. Mr. 
Lyman replied that he thought it did, but he stated amid applause 
that it was proposed soon to repeal the tenure of office act and that 
this was the stepping-stone to the repeal. A little wrangle arose 
upon a remark of Mr. Bayne of Pennsylvania that those who 
voted against the bill voted for the spoils system, and those who 
voted for it voted for good government. The altercation took a 
party tone, which was happily closed by Mr. Willis of Kentucky 
in saying: “ The whole system is undemocratic and unrepublican 
both.” The vote was then taken upon the motion to suspend 
the rules and pass the bill, which was lost by 146 yeas to 99 
nays. 

So the bill to repeal the statutes limiting the term of certain 
officers was lost, after a unanimous report in its favor, and after a 
very short, and, so far as the opposition was concerned, a 


I'O 


wholly unimportant, debate. It was not asserted that the con¬ 
stitutional want of limitation had shown any necessity for the act 
of 1820 and subsequent acts of the same kind. It was not denied 
that the limitation was imposed for a political purpose under pre¬ 
tense of the public welfare, and that the professed objects of the 
limitation had not been accomplished, but on the contrary that it 
had produced an immense abuse. The only semblance of argu¬ 
ment in opposition to the repeal was that the tenure of office law 
would enable the Senate to thwart the president, and that to repeal 
the four years’ term is to create a life tenure. The conflict 
between the executive and the Senate, however, is inherent 
in the constitution which has associated them in the appoint¬ 
ing power. The Senate can always practically thwart the 
president’s power of removal by refusing to confirm the nomination 
of a successor to the incumbent of an office, thus throwing upon 
the president, unless the reason for removal be flagrant and notor¬ 
ious, the responsibility of leaving the office unfilled and the public 
service in that office undone. The tenure of office act was the 
formal assertion in law of a power which great constitutional 
authorities have strongly asserted, and the claim to which the 
Senate has never relinquished. It is a conflict which in the nature 
of things will be constantly renewed, but, whatever form it may 
take, it does not seriously affect the question of the repeal of the 
four-years laws. For if at the expiration of the four-years’ term 
the president should renominate an honest and efficient officer and 
the Senate should refuse to confirm the nomination, it would justly 
incur the odium of preventing a fit appointment. If, on the other 
hand, the president, for partisan or other improper reasons, should 
seek to eject an honest and efficient officer from the public service 


II 


by nominating a successor, and the Senate should refuse to author¬ 
ize the outrage, the odium of the attempted wrong would be 
properly thrown upon the president. This would be true whether 
the attempt were made at the expiration of a four-years’ term or 
at any time when the president might deem a change desirable, 
and, as the repeal of the four-years’ act would not affect the atti¬ 
tude of the Senate towards executive nominations, and would 
restrain the abuse of the executive power of nomination by making 
the president and not the law responsible for an attempted change, 
the objection founded upon the tenure of office act disappears. 

The objection which is expressed in the cry of “ life tenure ” 
and “ a privileged class ” is one of the most ancient and familiar 
appeals of the spoils system to ignorance and prejudice. When¬ 
ever it has been proposed to recur to the constitutional principle 
and the early practice by treating the public clerk as the private 
clerk is treated, by ordaining that the public business shall be 
transacted upon business principles, and that filching politicians 
shall be forbidden to turn the public service to their private profit, 
we are told that a life tenure and a privileged class are odious and 
un-American, as if anything were so odious as a system tending to 
destroy the self-respect of public officers, or anything so really 
un-American as turning out an honest, efficient, and experienced 
agent because somebody else wants his place. There can, indeed, 
be no life tenure in an offensive sense so long as the power of re¬ 
moval is unchecked except by a sole consideration for justice and 
the public service; and the retention of a faithful, capable, and tried 
public servant confers no privilege which every such servant of 
every great corporation and of every great or small business house, 
and of every well-ordered department of human industry, does 


12 


not already enjoy. Of all the familiar tricks of the .American 
demagogue none is more amusingly contemptible than the effort 
to show that a system which tends to promote a degrading loss of 
self-respect and a cringing dependence upon personal favor is pecu¬ 
liarly a manly and American system. It is a cry raised most 
vociferously by those who most despise and distrust the people, 
and, as the sure and steady progress of reform plainly shows, it no 
more deceives and alarms an intelligent public opinion than the 
ridiculous assertion that civil-service reform is a system which re¬ 
quires that a man shall pass a satisfactory examination in as¬ 
tronomy and the higher mathematics in order to be eligible to 
appointment as a night-watchman in the custom-house. In the 
familiar story the young lawyer was reminded by the judge that 
the court might be supposed to know some law. The American 
demagogue is incessantly taught by the experience of this country 
that the American people may be supposed to have some common 
sense. 

While thus the efforts of the league under the first resolution, 
although not successful, have accomplished much in procuring a 
unanimous report in favor of the repeal of the four years’ laws, the 
results in carrying out the objects contemplated by the second 
resolution are still more gratifying. The New York reform bill, 
which was passed on the 4th of May, 1883, was to take effect on 
the 4th of January, 1884, and in the meantime the public service 
of the State was to be classified and the working scheme prepared 
to carry out the law. This wholly new and peculiarly delicate 
and difficult task was accomplished to the entire satisfaction of the 
commission by the chief examiner, Silas W. Burt, one of the most 
sagacious and experienced friends of the reformed system. In Sep- 


13 


tember the classification of the state service, now made for the first 
time, was completed, and it was promptly approved by the gov¬ 
ernor. In the same month the mayor of New York, whose action 
under the provisions of the bill as they then existed was discre¬ 
tionary, declared himself in favor of the reformed system and in¬ 
vited consultations with the state commission, and the mayor of 
Brooklyn adopted rules for the enforcement of the reform in that 
city. In November the mayor of New York announced the rules 
that he had approved, and the character and ability of the exam¬ 
ining boards that he appointed attested the intelligence and good 
faith with which he entered upon the work. The mayor of Buffalo 
introduced the reform system in that city, and early in December 
the rules and regulations adopted by the New York state com¬ 
mission were approved by the governor, whose fidelity and courage 
in promoting the reformed system are among his most conspicu¬ 
ous public services. In order to perfect the New York law, the 
state commission, upon consultation with the New York reform 
association, proposed to make the- reform system obligatory and 
not discretionary in the larger cities of the state. The governor 
approved the proposition and recommended it in a message to the 
Legislature accompanying the report of the commission, and in 
May the amended bill became a law. 

The result is that by the active cooperation of intelligent 
citizens of both parties who are neither dismayed nor in the 
least degree disturbed by any form of hostility whatever, the 
civil-service reform acts of the state of New York are now 
almost complete, and the reformed system is established by 
law with the consent and desire of the best citizens in the 
State in which the abuses of the spoils tyranny have been most 


14 


flagrant and degrading. All the admissions to the State Ser¬ 
vice are now determined by the competitive system with the ex¬ 
ception of elected officers; of officers confirmed by the Senate; 
of laborers; and of 52 special cases excepted by the commission 
for wholly satisfactory reasons. But further than this, and in strict 
accordance with the recommendations of the resolution of a year 
ago, the reformed system is now also introduced by law in the 23 
incorporated cities of the state. The mayor of each city is required 
to enforce it, and the police, fire, and law departments are not ex¬ 
empted from the operation of the law. Admissions to the city 
service are determined by competition, and soldiers and sailors of 
the civil war are given precedence over competitors of equal merit. 
The exceptions are elected officers; subordinates to superiors who 
are financially responsible for the subordinates ; officers in charge 
of public moneys and accountable for them; and officers of elec¬ 
tions. Rules and changes of rules adopted by the mayor are sub¬ 
ject to the approval of the state commission. No recommendation 
or certificate except concerning character or residence can be re¬ 
ceived from any member of the Legislature, from any officer con¬ 
firmed by the Senate, or from any judge. Political assessments or 
solicitation to give money for party objects, and promises of influ¬ 
ence to secure appointments as partisan rewards, are forbidden, 
and every form of such venal coercion is defined and punished as 
bribery. This extension of the reform system to the state and 
municipal service of New York is a prodigious achievement. It 
has been accomplished primarily, of course, by an intelligent pub¬ 
lic opinion and by the patriotic agreement of leading men of both 
parties. But it is the reform associations, in which happily party 
politics are unknown, which have enlightened public opinion and 


warned and guided legislative action. The expense of these asso¬ 
ciations is insignificant, and their intelligent activity comprehen¬ 
sive and untiring; and the results of that activity are extraordi¬ 
nary and of the highest public advantage. I doubt if there are 
any purely voluntary associations in the country which have pro¬ 
duced so noiselessly and so effectively results at once so great and 
so beneficent to political morality and the public welfare as the 
modest associations which compose the national civil-service re¬ 
form league. 

How thorough and complete is the work done by these asso¬ 
ciations is w’ell illustrated in the report of the committee of the 
New’ York association upon civil-service examinations which was 
requested by the state commission to inquire into the applicability 
of the reformed system to the police and fire departments of the 
city of New York. The report made in obedience to this request 
is a comprehensive statement of the general method of applying 
the principles of open competition to those branches of municipal 
service. Its clearness, simplicity, and good sense are conclusive; 
and, although the report is addressed to specific application of the 
reformed methods, it is in itself an admirable illustration of the 
practical spirit of reform. As I stated, last year. Mayor Low of 
Brooklyn, whose effective conduct of municipal affairs upon the 
principles of this reform has given the city an enviable distinction, 
has recently held a prolonged conference with the state commission 
upon the general subject, and the state commission and the good 
cause have the great advantage of the experience of one of the 
ablest of municipal executive officers, whose faith increases with 
his works, and whose works would quicken with saving faith the 
mind of the most incredulous scoffer at reform. Meanwhile in 


i6 


Massachusetts, where a committee of the state league was ap¬ 
pointed last year to consider the application of the reformed sys¬ 
tem to the municipal service, a state bill was introduced in the 
Legislature early in the session, which was finally passed and ap¬ 
proved on the 3d of June, and the commission which the governor 
has appointed is the earnest of a faithful and intelligent enforce¬ 
ment of the law. The act empowers the commissioners to pre¬ 
pare rules to govern the selection of officers and laborers both for 
the state and city service. This is a very comprehensive authority, 
and it devolves upon the Massachusetts commission the immediate 
consideration of a branch of the subject which has not yet been 
satisfactorily treated, namely, the application of the reformed sys¬ 
tem to the selection of laborers. This is an important and inter¬ 
esting question upon which the views of the commission will be 
eagerly awaited. But as the principle is easily applicable to mes¬ 
sengers and orderlies in public buildings and to guards in prisons, 
it will be doubtless found not less applicable to laborers. For the 
essential point is not to find coal-heavers who can scan Virgil 
correctly, but coal-heavers who, being properly qualified for 
heaving coal, are their own masters and not the tools of poli¬ 
ticians. 

The first annual report of the United States civil-service com¬ 
mission was submitted to the president on the 7th of February, 
and on the 29th he transmitted it to Congress with a special mes¬ 
sage, in which he congratulated Congress and the country on the 
good results already achieved by the reform, and declared his con¬ 
viction that it would henceforth prove to 6e of still more signal 
benefit to the public service. In November of last year the president 
forbade the choice among eligible candidates to be made for 


17 


political or religious reasons, and in concluding their report the 
commissioners state that in every stage of their work they have 
had the constant and unwavering support of the president. There 
is no reason to doubt that within the range of the 14,000 places 
to which the national law applies the reformed system, it has been 
honestly enforced both in its letter and its spirit. But it is not 
evident that the reformed spirit has generally prevailed beyond 
that range. Heads of departments and subordinate officers who 
are not sincerely friendly to reform will naturally perpetuate the 
old abuses whenever it is possible to perpetuate them, and there is 
little doubt that, in contravention of the purpose and the principle 
of reform, office-holders and the power of patronage in some of 
the states largely controlled the selection of delegates to the recent 
national conventions. For this abuse, however, no single indi¬ 
vidual can fairly be held responsible. The plain and honest 
declaration of the president five or six years ago that no public 
employe need feel obliged to pay a political assessment did not 
avail to prevent a general payment. The word of the president 
was not doubted, but the evil system was felt to be stronger than 
any officer, and there was then no law which protected the public 
employ^ from the plundering politicians. This has been now 
secured, and the enforcement of the law is guaranteed by public 
opinion. Should endeavors be made to evade the prohibition and 
to pick the pockets of the public servants, this league, and every 
association of which it is composed, stands ready to obey that 
opinion, and in both the national and the state service to hold the 
hand of the robber and to bring him to the judgment of the law 
and to the just scorn of the country. Public opinion is now thor¬ 
oughly alive to the iniquity of robbing by political assessment, and 


8 


it is plainly determined that politicians shall not sell the public 
service to the highest bidder. 

This abuse and kindred abuses which spring from the old 
system have been greatly ameliorated. But they will disappear 
wholly only when the national administration is thoroughly renewed 
and reinvigorated at every point by the spirit of reform at the head. 
Reform is accomplished not by those who acquiesce in it, but by 
those who believe in it. Congress passed the reform bill not be¬ 
cause Congress desired the reform, but because the country de¬ 
manded it. It is the young men who are represented in these 
associations, the young men in whose hearts and consciences lies 
the future of America, who supply the conviction and the energy 
which Congress does not dare to disregard, and who, succeeding 
in their turn to executive and legislative authority, will complete 
the work which has been so well begun. President Authur came 
to his great office with no prepossessions for reform in the civil 
service. But his honorable treatment of the new policy is one of 
his chief titles to public regard. Under the forms of law he could 
readily have baffled its operation and defeated its purpose. But 
his candor and good faith secured the fair trial of the new system 
within the prescribed limits, and the conspicuous and honorable 
fact that during his term and with his friendly cooperation the 
radical reform by law of the monstrous abuses of the American 
system of appointments and removals in the civil service began, 
will be the chief historic distinction of his tranquil and conserva¬ 
tive administration. 

Gentlemen, the immediate duty of the year before us is to 
urge to completion the repeal of the four-years laws, to secure the 
passage of other state reform bills, and to carry the reformed sys- 


^9 


tem still further into the municipal service. Unprecedented pro¬ 
gress has been made in all these directions, but, until this reform 
of administrative methods has become as much the irrevocable 
national and state policy as the personal freedom and equality 
before the law of every citizen, the work of this league and of the 
associations is not finished. Much has been done and much re¬ 
mains to do: and in congratulating you upon the extraordinary 
success in the accomplishment of the objects of the league during 
the last two years, 1 cannot forbear to mention one other service, 
but of another kind, that we have been able to render. It is an 
inestimable service in popular government, and it is the more con¬ 
spicuous at this moment because we are now involved in the bitter 
controversy of a presidential election. It is ^ the time in which 
party spirit rages uncontrolled, and in which, therefore, the fact 
which I mention is all the more impressive and significant, that 
the greatest and most beneficial reform in methods of administra¬ 
tion which lias ever been proposed in the country, a reform of 
abuses which were subjugating legitimate party action, destroying 
the moral authority of elections, demoralizing the public conscience, 
degrading official character, excluding able and upright men from 
public life, and disgracing the American name, has been begun and 
has been thus far effectively accomplished, not by party but by 
patriotism, by men in office and out of office, of different political 
convictions, strongly attached to different parties, anticipating 
political careers, yet cooperating with sincerity and enthusiasm, 
not as republicans, not as democrats, but solely as Americans; 
before all, proud of their country ; above all, resolved that the 
national name should be unstained and national politics raised to 
controversies of principle and policy. In all the proceedings of 


20 


our associations and of this league, in all our appeals and argu¬ 
ments, there has been no word and no thought of party. Both 
Houses of Congress passed the national reform bill with practical 
party unanimity. A democratic Legislature in New York, a 
republican Legislature in Massachusetts, passed a state reform bill; 
a republican president, a democratic governor, have been the two 
most conspicuous and effective executive agents in enforcing the 
reform. If in the mad tumult of party passion, in the storm of 
hatred, falsehood, and malignant injustice which a presidential 
election whirls over the land, some appalled citizen should be 
ready to despair of his country and to be ashamed of his kind, 
let him take heart again and be prouder than ever that he is an 
American, and anticipate with surer confidence the greater glory 
of his country, as he reflects that civil-service reform, thus far, has 
been the triumph of patriotism in the midst of party conflict and 
\ despite the ferocity of party spirit. 


Publications of the New York Association. 


What the Competitive Examinations really are. Per copy, 3 cts. 
Per 100,.$2 00 

Daniel Webster and the Spoils System. An extract from Senator 
Bayard’s oration at Dartmouth College, June, 1882. I'er copy, 3 cts. 
Per 100, . . . . . . . $i 50 

The “Pendleton Bill.” Bill to Regulate and Improve the Civil Service 
of the United States, as approved. Per copy, 3 cts. Per icx), $i 50 

How you may aid Civil Service Reform. By Alexander Fullerton. 
Per copy, - - - - - * . 5 cts. 

The Civil Service of Cities, Police and Fire Departments. .A 

Report to the C. .S. R. A. of N. Y. made by request of the State Civil 
Service Commission. Per copy, - - - - 5 

What has been done in New York and may be done elsewhere. 

Per copy, i ct. Per 100, - - - - 30 cts. 

Report of Mr. Hoblitzell, from the Mouse Committee on Reform in the 
Civil Service, against the Bill to repeal the “Pendleton Bill,” 
June 7th, 1884. Per copy, - - - ■ ' i ct. 

Debate on Civil Service Reform before 7 th Congress of P. E. 
Church. Per copy, - - - - - 5 ct5> 

Annual Report of the C. S. R. A. of N. Y., May, 1883. Per copy, 3 cts. 

The same for 1884 . Per copy, - -• - - - 3 cts. 


MISCELLANEOUS. 

Civil Service in Great Britain. By Dorman B. Eaton. I’er copy. 25 cts. 
New York City Civil Service Regulations. Per copy, - 5 cts. 

Report of the U. S. Civil Service Commission, 1884 . Per copy, 5 cts. 
Report of the N. Y. Civil Service Commission, 1884 . 

Orders for the publications will be filled by Wii.i.iam Poi is, .Secietary 
4 Pine Street, New York. 





nQ 1 

PRESIDENT. ’ ^ ' 

GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS. 


SECRETARY. 

WILLIAM POTTS. 


TREASURER. 

IRA BURSLEY. 


LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



lO 028 070 946 31 


EXECUTIVE 

WM. A. AIKEN, 

SILAS W. BURT, 

FREDERIC CROMWELI., 

JOHN JAY, 

A, R. MACDONOUGH, 

W. W. MONTGOMERY, 

J. HALL PLEASANTS, 


COMMITTEE. 

FREDERIC W. WHITRIDGE 
SHERMAN S. ROGERS, 
WILLIAM CARY SANGER. 
CARL SCHURZ, 
MOORFIELD STOREY, 
EVERETT P. WHEELER, 
MORRILL WYMAN, JR. 


The formation of local Associations in every locality 
where a nucleus can be found is much to be desired, and 
the Secretary of the League will be glad to assist any move¬ 
ment in that direction. Each Association, when formed, 
should establish an official connection with the National 
I.eague. The details of the organization having been 
furnished to the Executive Committee through the Secre¬ 
tary, that Committee is authorized to admit the association 
to membership in the League, whereupon it is entitled to 
elect a member of the General Committee and a representa¬ 
tive Vice-President. The Secretary should thereafter be 
kept informed of the progress of the work, and of changes 
of officers as they may occur. 

Address 

WILLIAM POTTS, 

Secf'efary. 




NO. 4 PINE STREET, NEW YORK. 




